Bulk of Non-State Political Violence in 2015 Took Place in Syria and
Iraq, Says IHS Jane’s Terrorism and Insurgency Centre

Attacks in Ukraine up three-fold; Islamic State attacks up over 50
percent and are more than six times the attacks numbers of next active
group

January 14, 2016 06:05 AM Eastern Time

LONDON--(EON: Enhanced Online News)--A total of 18,987 attacks in total by non-state armed groups was carried
out in 2015, according to open source data collected by IHS Inc. (NYSE:
IHS), the leading global source of critical information and insight.

“Significantly, the
Donetsk People’s Republic carried out more attacks than the Taliban in
2015”

Almost half of these attacks took place in Syria and Iraq and 3,317 of
them, or 17 percent, were claimed by the Islamic State, according to the
2015 IHS Jane’s Terrorism and Insurgency Centre Global Attack Index.

IHS
Jane’s Terrorism and Insurgency Centre (IHS JTIC) used open source
information to record attacks from terrorist and insurgent groups
worldwide. IHS JTIC defines an “attack” as any incident in which a
sub-state actor (either an individual or organisation) commits an
illegal act of politically- or ideologically-motivated violence against
persons or property, with the aim of coercing others to adopt or comply
with its objectives or to submit to their authority, which results in
death, damage, or disruption.

“For the second year in a row, the Islamic State was the most
operationally-active non-state armed group,” said Matthew Henman, head
of the IHS JTIC. “Underlining this, the total number of attacks claimed
by or attributed to the group in 2015, increased by more than half and
was more than six times higher than the nearest most active recorded
group.”

The intensification of the Islamic State’s operations came as the group
faced increasing territorial pressure in Iraq and Syria, with the
existing, separate United States-led coalition airstrike campaigns in
these countries added to by the beginning of a Russian military
intervention in Syria in late September. Although the Islamic State is
facing its greatest challenge to date, with territory being chiseled
away in both Syria and Iraq -- notably losing control of the city of
Ramadi in December -- the group’s capacity to launch operations remains
largely undiminished.

Global attack numbers decrease year-on-year

The 2015 figures represented a slight 6.5 percent decrease from the
recorded number of attacks in 2014 and a significant 39.8 percent
decrease in the number of non-militant fatalities. This decrease in
fatalities was principally driven by a seeming de-intensification of
certain high-tempo conflicts, most notably in Syria, although this may
have been exacerbated by an increasing absence of either verifiable
open-source casualty information or breakdowns of casualty figures
between militants and non-militants.

Taliban unseated by Ukrainian separatists

The growing level of violence in eastern Ukraine was reflected by the
two main pro-Russia separatist organisations, the Donetsk People’s
Republic (DPR) and the Luhansk People’s Republic (LPR) being in the top
10 most active non-state armed actors in 2015. “Significantly, the
Donetsk People’s Republic carried out more attacks than the Taliban in
2015,” Henman said. “The 1,113 recorded attacks in Ukraine in 2015
represented an almost trebling of the 2014 total, reflecting the
intensifying nature of the separatist insurgency in the eastern regions
of Donetsk and Luhansk.”

The actual total number of operations conducted by both the DPR and LPR
was likely far higher than that recorded in open sources by IHS JTIC,
with a substantial number of reports of attacks lacking key details,
typically the event date, and thereby causing them to be recorded as
statements rather than attacks.

US attacks almost treble

In the United States, the recorded number of attacks by non-state actors
almost trebled (13 to 38) between 2014 and 2015, with a near quadrupling
in the resultant non-militant fatalities (nine to 32). While two of the
most high-profile of the attacks were conducted by suspected Islamist
militants -- the San Bernardino shootings and the killing of five US
Marines in Chattanooga -- the increase was largely driven by a growing
incidence of low-level, far-right racially- or ideologically-motivated
violence.

Notably, the killing of nine people at a predominantly African American
church in Charleston was followed over the remainder of the year by at
least nine separate arson attacks on African American churches across
the southern US. There have also been notable shooting and arson attacks
at Planned Parenthood clinics throughout the country.

The IHS
Jane’s Terrorism and Insurgency Centre uses open source data to
build its global database of terrorist and insurgent events. The IHS
Jane’s Global Terrorism & Insurgency Attack Index is an annual
report for clients highlighting key data and global trends from this
database, which is updated on a daily basis. The database enables users
to search by location, target, group (active and dormant), tactics and
casualty numbers in order to quickly obtain actionable intelligence
and/or data. The database includes over 200,000 events since 2009 and
over 250 group profiles. Information from social media that could not be
verified through conventional and trusted news sources is not included
in the data.

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